Thursday, August 22, 2013

F. Scott Fitzgerald - The Great Gatsby VII

"This is most likely the worst book I've ever read. Fitzgerald spends most of his pages describing the characters and their actions."

"I don't even see how its considered a Classic Masterpiece of Literature. Daisy was just dumb. Tom was even more of an idiot. Gatsby.....How the hell would he even be great? So he had a few parties. Whoopitee do."

"Read this because I had to. Taught it because they made me."

"Yuck, yuck yuck. One of my ELA30 students chose to write a report on this, and so I had to read it. I hate it"

"It's a shame this book is 'required reading' for all freshmen at the high school where I teach. No wonder the vast majority of my students believe they 'hate to read.' Though thoughtfully written, I could not connect with the author, relate to the characters, or appreciate the content as a 35 year old, and compared to a 14 year old American teenager, I have many more life experiences, much more background knowledge, and college level history classes under my belt to help me connect or even enjoy this novel.

So many of my students are not reading on grade level, and this text is what we are assigning them to read? What a horrible advertisement for reading and English classes in general. I had to force myself through the last 10 pages and I don't feel better educated or smarter for having done so. My poor students!"

"It is implied that New Yorkers were corrupt and wealthy"

"Perhaps because the novel was so strangely written, and I, creative when needing to be pragmatic and suddenly very literal when needing to understand things for more than their surface traits, still am unable to comprehend the title of the book: The Great Gatsby. In my opinion, the man wasn't really great at all."

"I don't see what's so great about Gatsby anyway ... The text itself was dry and hard to swallow, like stale bread. Perhaps I am an illiterate for not liking great American literature. Perhaps people are sheep to say that they actually enjoy reading this."

"I got the book online and read around 42 pages, which is one third of the book. It was as if some drunk is telling story of some events. I could not grasp anything out of it. It seem to me as if I am finding some path in darkness despite reading third of the book. No doubt I ditched it there. Must avoid."

"I am astonished that this is considered one of the greatest English-language novels of all time. The nearly universal assessment of 'The Great Gatsby' as a 'masterpiece' is, to my mind, a clear condemnation of our culture as superficial, hollow, and founded upon the most dubious of values. What does it matter that the author's style and technique are impeccable? What does it matter that language, setting, pace, plot, and symbolism are expertly and intricately woven together? What does it matter that the characterizations are finely honed and expertly wrought if, in the final analysis, they and their actions are, without exception, despicable? ... To those who insist that Fitzgerald was trying to write a cautionary tale, I would counter that he might have succeeded, had he included any identifiable, emphatic caution whatsoever."

"Wow. This book was just plain bad. Entire story could have been told in three paragraphs. The rest is just fluff. Really boring fluff."

"If you like sops you would like this book. I do not like sops."

"I baffles me that people consider 'The Great Gatsby' to be one of the best books ever written. To me the plot is clichéd and boring, the characters, with the exception of Tom, are bland and uninteresting and the social commentary falls flat on its pretensions arse. I only have to assume F. Scott Fitzgerald had his head so far up his own rectum, he didn't realize what he was writing was utter horse shit. Or then again Fitzgerald could be the Ed Wood of the literary industry. This is by far and away one of the worst books I have ever read, stay as far away from this as possible and instead read a book with one of the most, if not the most, interesting plots in a book ever, the best character in literary history and very direct social commentary, Fight Club."